Author Terry Fallis Shares His Planning Strategies

One of the most difficult parts of writing is figuring out how to get started, when you’ve got nothing more than the spark of an idea and a blank piece of paper.

Students in Grade 12 Writer’s Craft got some advice from a professional: Terry Fallis, author and two-time winner of the Stephen Leacock Memorial Medal for Humour. Fallis visited Greenwood as part of the Writers in Residence program, which brings in published authors so students can learn from their first-hand experience.

Fallis spoke to students about his own writing process. Fallis is a self-described “planner,” meaning the majority of the time that he spends working on a novel happens in the planning stage, before he has written so much as the opening sentence. This is in opposition to “pantsers,” or those who write by the seats of their pants, seeing where their writing takes them.

Fallis said that there is nothing better or worse about either method, and that it depends on the individual’s writing style. However, he was able to provide some useful strategies so students could try planning out their work. He compared it to essay writing strategies. It is more difficult to write an essay if you are trying to figure out your thesis statement and main points along the way.

He provided some useful tricks for students to try planning out their stories, such as creating detailed timelines and story maps. By trying out these strategies, students can test a new approach to writing, and figure out if they are a planner, a pantser, or somewhere in between!